There are at least 501 reasons why you shouldn't attempt to read every one of the baseball books that Ron Kaplan has challenged you to corral, consume and contemplate in his new reference tome, "501 Baseball Books fans Must Read Before They Die."

One, it may kill you prematurely.

Another: You could drive yourself to the brink of death just trying to track down some of these obscure classics, even with an infinite amount of time, money and patience to pour through libraries, online used book stores or private collectors estate sales.

Still, the 55-year-old Kaplan has already announced on his popular RonKaplansBaseballBookshelf.com blog that his University of Nebraska publication, which doesn't officially hit the stores until Monday, has already reached No. 1 on Amazon.com's list of "Education & Reference."

With the subset of "Writing, Research & Publishing Guides." Which is connected to the subset of "Publishing & Books." Which leads into "Bibliographies & Indexes." All as it relates to "Literature."

"Who knew they even had that category?" Kaplan said Thursday from his office of the New Jersey Jewish News in Whippany, N.J., where he works as the sports and features editor and awaits the opening of the Major League Baseball season.

Who knew there were even 501 books worth recommending - a list that doesn't even include W.P. Kinsella's "Shoeless Joe," Lawrence S. Ritter's "The Glory of their Times" or even Roger Kahn's "The Boys Of Summer."

Those omissions, Kaplan can now admit, were more as a result of him being too deep into the jungle of his own collection and easily assuming they were already included as he worked feverishly last fall to produce this for a spring debut.

Then again, Kaplan's genuine intent is that fringe readers of fine baseball literature explore works they might not otherwise knew existed, so it's OK not to get bogged down in those you should already know exist..

"Ultimately, those titles are on everyone's top-10 or top-5 list, and they deserve a shot here," Kaplan reasoned. "There are umpteen biographies of Ted Williams and Mickey Mantle and Babe Ruth as well.

"But who's going to tell you to go find `The Tao of Baseball,' something that really is so different and makes you think?"

That specifically would be catalogued as No. 393 on Kaplan's list, written in 1991 by Go - the nom de plume for Canadian author Gordin Bell - who added the subtitle: "Entertaining and Thought-Provoking Commentaries on the National Pastime."

There is no ranking, actually, to this. Numbers assigned are random as they get grouped into genres -- fiction, non-fiction, history, instructional, kids reading. Even cookbooks.

Kaplan's big dig goes back to the 1888 "Base-Ball: How to Become a Player," by John Montgomery Ward, the first player-written overview of the game now found free on various websites thanks to it being reissued by the Society for American Baseball Research in 1993.

"Second base," Ward writes, "is the prettiest position to play of the entire in-field."

It also goes all the way up to 2012 inclusions of the R.A. Dickey autobiography and Marty Appel's "Pinstripe Empire."

Many of Kaplan's reviews were logged into the website www.librarything.com, shared with millions of other subscribers.

Something like "The Great American Novel," produced in 1973 by Philip Roth, comes with Kaplan's endorsement of it being "a gem often overlooked in discussions of the best baseball novels, due to the constant praise heaped on the works of Malamud, Harris and Kinsella."

At Kaplan's home, his unfinished attic is the paradise found of his own shelved baseball book collection, which he says numbers in the thousands.

In the basement go the boxes of books that he's enjoyed and is ready to send back out into the world.

"They're nice to have, but you're never going to ever have every single baseball book, so what's the point?" he asks.

Kaplan doesn't fear a time when books will dissolve into powder and replaced by everything on a Kindle or Nook. Still, there's nothing like the hands-on experience of discovering baseball literature literally in book form.

"That might sound old fashion, but there's also the smell of the pages - sometimes dusty and mildew," he said. "I don't know if publishing going forward will change to make things more economical to produce, but I'll read anything - I'll read a cereal box or a tooth-paste tube."

Even better if it's written by Rob Neyer or David Nemec.

McCarver showed he can dish it out - and take it

Reaction to the news of Tim McCarver's announcement Wednesday that this will be his final season as an analyst with Fox Sports' MLB game of the week package turned predictably into an Internet badminton tournament.

"McCarver, a great voice for baseball, will be missed," was the headline on an MLB.com story.

"Should we miss Tim McCarver?" started one debate on SBNation.com. USAToday.com started posting Twitter responses in hopes of generating more hits about which side of the baseline you fall when it comes to judging the three-time Emmy Award winner, who spent more than two decades doing national games for ABC, CBS and - since 1996 - at Fox and has covered more televised World Series games than any broadcaster ever.

The best response we took to heart came from broadcast partner Joe Buck. He said he not only learned more about the game from McCarver than he did from his own Hall of Fame broadcasting father Jack Buck, but he saw how to deal with criticism as one who could not only dish it out as part of his job but also take it (even in the form of a Deion Sanders' water bucket).

Fox executive Eric Shanks said on a conference call that his admiration for McCarver came from "his toughness as a broadcaster and player," Buck added: "Eric was dead right ... to describe Tim as tough. What makes him great is he doesn't let criticism bother him. He takes it and he moves on. He doesn't mind the online stuff, which isn't easy to do in this world. But he takes it, and moves on.

"If a player or manager doesn't like something he said, he taught me more about handling all that stuff than anyone. No one is even close. He's everything you'd want in a teammate - if ever there was something said about me (critically), you gotta hold him back.

"I've learned more from that attitude around players, managers, bloggers, online people, and for that, I'm eternally grateful."

Former Dodgers first baseman Eric Karros, working on Fox's regional coverage since 2007 as well as on the Dodgers' KCAL-Channel 9 studio show, should be a front-runner to replace McCarver starting in 2014 - unless a position opens on the Dodgers' local telecasts with the new team-owned channel. That could also happen if Vin Scully decided to retire after this year.

TBS' Ron Darling and John Smoltz have also been mentioned as potential Fox hires as well in various media speculation. A story in USA Today also speculated that the recently retired Chipper Jones could be a viable candidate, as could Jim Deshaies, Brad Ausmus or Bobby Valentine.

WHAT SMOKES

==Must-see video of the week is a 12-minute piece that went up on Grantland.com called "Silver Reunion," a piece orchestrated by filmmaker Rory Karpf in which he brings together all 12 members of the U.S. men's 1972 Olympic basketball team to take a vote on whether they're willing to finally accept the silver medal that they declined picking up after their chaotic, controversial and some think Cold War conspiracy-driven 51-50 loss to the Soviet Union in the championship game. Former Long Beach State star and two-time All American Ed Ratleff, who these days is an insurance agent in Long Beach, joined teammates such as Doug Collins, Bobby Jones, Tom McMillen and Tom Burleson in Lexington, Ky., last August for the group interview, which causes some still to wipe away tears when discussing the circumstances they endured as young college players in Munich, West Germany.

WHAT CHOKES

== What would convince Disney/ABC/ESPN to commit to a new six-year extension at $12 million per season to retain the possession arrow for a rebranded WNBA? ESPN, involved with covering the trying-to-stay-relevant women's pro league games since it launched in 1997, announced the transaction Thursday, having combined these rights deals in the past with its NBA contracts. Now, this separation gives ESPN the ability to show games on its ESPN3 website and WatchESPN phone app. Plus, they'll push the WNBA draft (at the network's Bristol, Conn., studios) into prime time and start the season with a Memorial Day doubleheader next month (neither game involving the Sparks). Is there really that kind of demand for ESPN's supply of games, studio shows and espnW.com coverage? Sounds more like a goodwill offer to eventual NBA commissioner Adam Silver, who will replace David Stern starting next February.